Daily rants from a couple of bostonians

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Time Travel

I think about time travel a lot. But in a completely narcissistic way. Like, I’d go back to all the times I got beat up, and find the person that kicked my ass five minutes before my younger self showed up and just beat the shit out of the guy, you know? Just like, punch him in the face and kick him in the ribs kind of shit. And I’d win, too. I’d definitely win this time because the last legitimate fight I was in was in middle school, so the oldest guy I’d have to fight would be 13, and I can definitely kick a 13-year-old’s ass. I’d be worried though, that I might hit him too hard and put him in a coma or something, or worse, I’d have a flashback to when he kicked my ass, even though he technically hasn’t yet because my younger self hasn’t shown up yet, but anyway, what if I had a flashback and just totally lost my shit? I’d grab the kid by the collar and force him to stare into my eyes and be like:

“Yeah, bitch. Look at me. Look deep into my eyes. Do you recognize me? Huh? (in a higher pitched voice) How about now? Do you realize who I am yet?”

And he would. He would realize that I’m me, except 17 years older. And then 30-year-old Dave would run off and hide just when 13-year-old Dave shows up, and completely fucks this kid’s mind up. That’s how narcisitic I am: Instead of doing something that would change history or make the world a better place, I’d go back in time and completely destroy a kid’s life just to prevent getting a minor black eye.

But you know what’s stupid? When people talk about time travel and say dumb shit like: “I’d go back and kill Hitler and prevent the Holocaust, or, I’d go back and meet Jesus.”

OK. First of all, let’s go through a few scenarios involving Hitler.

You go back to 1938 or 39, just before concentration camps start up. How are you going to get to Berlin? Like, what? You’re just going to hop on a commercial flight to Germany, take a taxi to his house, because at that time, every taxi driver in Germany knows where Hitler lives! And then you’re going to get out, walk right past his SS body guards who just ignore the person wearing strange clothes and who can’t speak German, and just showed up to Hitler’s house unannounced, just walk right by them, knock on the door and when Hitler answers, you what? Pull out a random gun that you just so happen to have stuffed in your pants? I guess it would have to be a Luger since you’re in Germany unless you somehow snuck it by security at the airport, and while I’m sure security wasn’t as crazy to get by as it is today, considering the world is on the brink of war, I’d imagine they’d spot a gun in your pants, but let’s ignore that fact and just get to where you shoot Hitler in the face, because, you know, killing someone is EASY. Just point the gun at his head and pull the trigger. BAM! No more Holocaust! WRONG! You know what would happen even if you managed to do all that? First, all those guards would shoot your body with their bullets until there was nothing left of you. And then, upon hearing that an American killed Hitler, all of Germany would rally to declare war on America before we had a chance to build up an arsenal. Oh and preventing the Holocaust? No, the only thing you’d succeed in doing is pissing off Goebbels and Himmler, who would honor their dead furher by killing all the Jews in Europe as quickly as possible, skipping the concentration camps and just going with blow torches and machine guns instead. So, well done. You helped Germany win WW2 and made the Holocaust even worse than what it was.

Second scenario; and I love this one. Kill Hitler when he’s a baby! Because that’s totally fine. Not only do you have to go through the same trouble of getting to Germany, but then you have to sneak into his parents’ house, go into his room, and kill a fucking baby. I know it’s Hitler, but it’s pre-Nazi psychopath Hitler. I doubt any of you would actually be able to go through with it, so you’d come back to present time and get so depressed that you let Hitler live and allow the Holocaust to happen that you’d kill yourself, and according to Christian belief, go to Hell, where you’d then see Hitler every day for eternity.

You know what I’d do? I would go back to the moment just before Hitler got rejected from art school, put a gun to his professor’s head and tell him: “You will accept Adolf into school and give him straight A’s until he graduates, or I will find you and kill you and your family. Oh, you also have to convert him to Judaism. Good luck!”

Then you have people who say they’d go back and meet Jesus. Again, explain to me how the fuck you are going to get to Jerusalem? Planes won’t be invented for another 1800 years, and I’m pretty sure a boat would take two years to get across the ocean, not to mention once you got across the ocean you then have to figure out how to communicate with the locals, none of whom speak English because the language hasn’t been invented yet, and you’d have to trade your Tevas for a camel – and yes, if you’re the type of person who says you’d go back in time to meet Jesus, you wear fucking Tevas – learn how to ride the camel, and navigate your way through the desert without any GPS or even a map – just using the stars as guides to travel hundreds of miles of uncivilized, dangerous terrain. No big deal, right? So, you get to Jerusalem, you find Jesus, who also doesn’t speak English but he’s God so he must be able to understand, and you say:

“Hello Jesus. I just traveled here from THE FUTURE to meet you.” Effectively making you history’s most epic one-upper. You meet Jesus and you’re like “Wow, you’re amazing. You cure the blind, turn water into wine, you cure leprosy, you can walk on water…I just TRAVELED 2000 YEARS THROUGH TIME! No biggie. Oh, and with modern medicine and technology, I can actually do all the things you do. Well, maybe not me directly, but I can do it vicariously….you know what, nevermind.”

And of course, others get wind of this and Jesus loses all credibility. People are like:

1st person: “The son of God? Please. This man (or woman) came from the year 2014!

2nd person: “2014? What year is it now? Negative 5?”

And of course, you tell Jesus that billions of people still worship him and know him to be the son of God who was crucified and died for all our sins, and Jesus is like:

Jesus: “Crucified? Wait, did you just say crucified? When do I get crucified? (Looks up) Dad? DAD! Who is this person and what’s this about being crucified for all of man’s sins? DAD!

So yeah, well done. You one-upped Jesus, took away all his credibility, changing the course of history and now we all worship Kevin, the one and true time traveling savior!